My home computer is a tricked-out 2011 ThinkPad W520. I find it to still be very fast and a joy to use. This post describes upgrades I’ve made to keep the machine relevant in 2018.

I got the W520 as my main work laptop in late 2011. In fact, you can see it in this 2012 AppHarbor housewarming invitation connected to two 23″ portrait-mode monitors. I spec’ed it with a quad-core/8-thread i7-2820QM 2.3/3.4GHz 8MB L3 processor, 8GB RAM, and two 320GB spinning disks configured for RAID 0 (You had to order with a RAID setup to get that option, and 320GB disks was the cheapest way to do that).

After taking delivery I switched out the disk drives for two 120GB Patriot Wildfire SSDs, also in RAID 0. The result was a 1GB/s read-write disk array which was good for 2011. At some later point I upgraded to 32GB RAM (4x8GB)—memory was much cheaper back then. I also added a cheap 120GB mSATA SSD for scratch storage (the mSATA slot is SATAII, so somewhat slower).

After leaving AppHarbor I used the W520 only sporadically for testing Windows Server pre-releases and running test VMs. Whenever I did, though, I found myself thinking “oh year, this is a really neat and fast machine, I should use it for something”. In 2017 I moved into condo and got to have a home office after 7 years of moving between assorted shared San Francisco houses and apartments. For my home PC, I wanted to see if I could make the W520 work.

My main requirement was a system that can power a 4K monitor running at 60hz. The W520 has a reasonably fast Nvidia discreet GPU and can render 4K just fine using remote desktop, but neither the VGA port nor the DisplayPort on the laptop can push out that many pixels to a plugged-in monitor.

Luckily the W520 has a bunch of expansion options that can potentially host a more modern graphics adapter:

2xUSB 3.0 ports

Internal mini-PCIe slot used for WiFi adapter (the Lenovo BIOS whitelists approved devices however, so a hacked BIOS is required to plug in anything fun)

ExpressCard 2.0 slot

ExpressCard technology was on the way out in 2011 but had reached its zenith and in the W520 offers a direct interface to the system PCI Express bus. This avoids the overhead and extra latency of the USB protocol. An “eGPU” ExpressCard to PCIe adapter is required to plug in a real graphics card and I got the $50 EXP GDC.

I settled on a Nvidia GTX 1050ti graphics card since it’s reasonably fast and power efficient. Note that a 220W Dell power brick is also required to power the PCIe dock and graphics card.

UPDATE:This script from a user on the eGPU.io forums fixed the “Error 43” incompatibility for me. Recent Nvidia driver versions have introduced an incompatibility with eGPU setups and I spent some time troubleshooting “Error 43” before getting output on the external screen. I never got recent drivers to work, but version 375.70 from 2016 is stable for me—implausibly since it predates and is not supposed to support the 1050-series GPU. The old driver has proven to be a problem only when trying to play very recent games, and is not a blocker (but do get in touch if you happen to have gotten a setup like this working with the latest Nvidia drivers). I also tried a Radeon RX 560. While it didn’t require old drivers to work, it had all sorts of other display-artifact problems that I didn’t feel like troubleshooting.

The standard ZOTAC fans are loud and I replaced them with a single 80mm Noctua fan mounted with zip-ties. The fan connector is not the right one but can be jammed onto the graphics card fan header and wedged under the cooler. I removed the W520 keyboard and zip-tied another USB powered92mm fan to the CPU cooler so that the (louder) built-in fan doesn’t have to spin up as frequently (not in picture below).

The whole assemblage (gutted laptop festooned with adapters, the PCIe dock with graphics card, power bricks) is mounted on the wall under my desk. After much experimentation the components are now zip-tied to an IKEA SKÅDIS pegboard. The pegboard comes with stand-off wall mounts which allows some of the many cables to run behind the board. I put a small fridge magnet on the screen bezel where the “lid closed” sensor sits to keep the built-in LCD screen off.

I’m still very happy with the W520, and while I’m not sure getting the eGPU setup working was economical in terms of time invested (over just buying parts for a proper desktop), it was a fun project. To my amazement, it merrily runs slightly dated games like XCOM 2 and Homeworld 2 Remastered in full, glorious 4K.

Lenovo still supports the platform and recently released BIOS updates to address the Meltdown/Spectre exploits.

With the RAID 0 SSD disk system, the quad-core W520 still feels deadly fast and is a joy to use. It boots instantaneously and restoring a Chrome session with stupid many tabs (something I’m bad about) is quick. With 32GB of RAM I can run Docker for Windows and a handful of VMs without worry.

I use a 49″ 4K TV as my computer monitor both at home and at work. TVs are generally much cheaper than computer monitors of the same size. For my use of general productivity, programming and very occasional gaming, a mid-size 4K TV beats getting a couple of regular monitors on both price and result.

How to take advantage of a 49″ monitor? Windows 10 has simple window tiling functionality (“Snap Assist”), and you can use Win + arrow keys to quickly arrange windows in a 2×2 equally-sized grid. On a 49″ screen, each of those 4 grid elements are the size of ~25″ screens, which is generous for browser windows or 2-pane text editors. This 4 window setup is what I mostly use when I’m being lazy.

If I’m working on the same thing for a while, I use WindowGrid to divvy up my screen to fit more apps. I really wish Windows had a way to customize the snap grid pattern, but WindowGrid is a good alternative. 3 horizontal by 2 vertical is perfect because you can have two centered apps, the three columns are plenty wide and it’s still quick to shuffle windows around a 6-pane grid.

Home: Samsung UN49KS8500 Curved 49″

I first got this 2016 curved Samsung 49″ TV to use with my home computer. I bought it used for $766. It’s the best monitor setup I’ve ever had (I’ve previously used and enjoyed dual 23″ IPS panels, 27″ Apple Cinema Display and 27″ Dell 4k monitor). I use it on a deep (32″) floating desk that I built in my office. The depth of the desk combined with the slight screen curve makes 49″ the perfect size. I don’t have to move my head much to look from one side of the screen to the other, and the screen fills up my field of view. The bezel is almost non-existent and the stand is attractive and doesn’t take up much desk-space. Text renders crisply, the colors are beautiful and the picture is calm at 60Hz.

Office: TCL 49S405 49″

When I re-joined Salesforce a couple of months ago, I asked to get a 27″ 4K monitor because I had liked that while working at Docker. Unfortunately the IT department decided I was not approved for such extravagance (that’s not a dig at Salesforce—in fact, you should come work with me). Since I was so happy with my home setup, I went ahead and approved myself for a $320 2017 vintage 49″ non-curved 4K TV which was more-or-less the cheapest 4k TV on Amazon at the time.

Receiving the giant box at the office was a surreal experience: It seems improbable that this much plastic, LCD, electronics, polystyrene and cardboard can be put together and schlepped to a 3rd floor San Francisco office so cheaply. I suspect TCL is an Elon-Musk-like organization, only instead of obsessively working backwards from the cost of kerosene and aircraft-grade aluminium to determine how cheaply one ton of satellite can be put into orbit, they do the same for plastic and liquid crystals to get cheap TVs into people’s living rooms.

With the TV assembled on my work desk, I realized that this setup was not going to be as awesome as my home configuration:

My work desk is narrower, so I sit closer to the screen

With no curve (and sitting so close) the sides of the screen begin to suffer from fading because of the oblique viewing angle

While not bad, the TV screen panel is just not as good as the Samsung unit

I’ve partly addressed the two first problems by building and mounting desk extenders, and after much calibration and fiddling, I managed to get an OK picture out of the TCL TV. Even so, I’d definitely recommend limiting yourself to 43″ unless you have a big desk and/or you can get a curved TV. I had in fact planned to get the 43″ TCL model, but it’s only $20 cheaper so I made the mistake of springing for 49″.

Summary

Overall I’d heartily recommend getting a 4K TV for use as a monitor if you have the space. I can’t think of a setup I’d prefer over my current home office TV: dual 27″ screens have a bezel-seam down the middle and I have way more screen real-estate than any of the 34″ wide-screen monitors available. 4K has so many pixels that, even when spread out over 49″ and sitting just 2-3′ away, graininess is not really an issue. Another advantage is that TVs come with passable speakers—I listen to music piped over HDMI from my computer at home, and it’s fine (if not exactly amazing).

49″ is the largest TV that makes sense in my experience, and depending on your desk and ergonomics, 43″ is probably a better choice. When choosing a TV model, be sure to get one that supports chroma 4:4:4 (my $320 one does). Otherwise the TV will sub-sample the image and text will look smudged.

One final word of caution: If you sit in an open office (like me), expect to spend on average 15 minutes every day explaining random passersby why there’s a TV on your desk.